Senate To Ask Gallagher Why Lawyer Threatened Teacher

September 8, 1999|By LINDA KLEINDIENST Tallahassee Bureau Chief

TALLAHASSEE - — - Education Commissioner Tom Gallagher will be asked by a Senate committee today why his top lawyer threatened a teacher for urging a legal challenge to how the state grades public schools.

Senate Democratic Leader Buddy Dyer of Orlando called the threat "an outrage" that constitutes "governmental harassment and intimidation" and asked for the public explanation.

At issue is a letter written by Michael Olenick, the education department's general counsel, to Rob McMahon, head of the Pinellas County teacher union.

McMahon appeared at an August public meeting of the Pinellas County School Board, where he urged the board to challenge a system used by the state to assign A through F letter grades to every public school.

Gallagher caused an uproar in late June, when he released the first statewide list of school grades. More than three-fourths of the state's schools earned a C or less, including 78 schools that got an F.

The grades were based on a complex scoring system quickly established by Gallagher's staff. The system was a mix of the new law and old rules, but it never went through the public hearing that had been anticipated by the new law.

The grading system, which rewards the A schools with more money and promises private school vouchers to students at some F schools, is part of Gov. Jeb Bush's "A-Plus" plan, which was passed by the Legislature last spring. Under the education reform plan, students enrolled at a school graded F twice within a four-year period are allowed to take state vouchers to pay private school tuition. Two Pensacola elementary schools have already fallen into that category.

The state's two teacher unions have challenged the A-Plus plan based on the voucher provision.

But questions have now been raised about how the Department of Education implemented the grading system this summer -- without the criteria being publicly discussed by the state Board of Education, the governor and Cabinet.

McMahon offered union money to help the School Board pay for legal action. The board is still considering the offer.

But several days after making the offer, McMahon received Olenick's letter warning him against "stirring up litigation" against the state -- an action Olenick claimed "may in fact cross the line of ethics and law" because the union offered to help pay the legal costs.

"I was so shocked that someone in a state agency would write a letter of that type," Dyer, a member of the Senate Education Committee, said on Tuesday. "Without question, it's aimed at stifling free speech. As elected officials, we can't condone this type of conduct by our state agencies."

Dyer asked Anna Cowin, R-Leesburg and head of the Senate Education Committee, to have Olenick appear before the committee to explain his actions. Cowin also asked Gallagher to appear.

"In the letter, Mr. Olenick rather aggressively threatens a Florida citizen for exercising his lawful right to disagree with the executive branch and seek redress in the courts," Dyer wrote to Cowin. "In my seven years in the Florida Senate, I have never seen a more blatant abuse of office."

Linda Kleindienst can be reached at lkleindienst@sun-sentinel.com or 850-224-6214.